by Sam Amick, USA TODAY Sports

by Sam Amick, USA TODAY Sports

LOS ANGELES ‚?? The loudest of buzzers went off yet again late Tuesday night, Kobe Bryant's cell phone informing him like it always does that it was time to take those tired, old feet out of the ice that soothed them.

The time may come when the routine of that blaring noise won't be symbolic of this alarming Lakers season, a chaotic campaign in which expectations and reality have been about as close to each other as Phil Jackson and Jim Buss. But that time is not now, and nothing about their 101-100 win over lowly Charlotte at the Staples Center changed that.

Three-game winning streak be darned, the warning signs remain.

Forward Pau Gasol returned from an eight-game absence (knee tendinitis) to provide moderate impact, those flashes of how he can help wrapped in a cocoon of confusion about what his role will be under coach Mike D'Antoni. Then after finishing with 10 points, nine rebounds, five assists and four blocks, Gasol ‚?? who will spend the next weeks and possibly months in an informal tryout of sorts while the Lakers decide whether or not he needs to be traded - admitted to USA TODAY Sports that the uncertainty remains about whether or not both he and center Dwight Howard can flourish in D'Antoni's spread offense.

"I don't find (playing with Howard) tough," Gasol said as he stood at the loading dock. "It's more the system right now that makes it tough at times, because (D'Antoni) wants four guys to be spread and one interior guy and it's a guard-oriented system, so that makes it tough.

"I think there's enough looks for both of us. But again, it's not a system that you post up a lot, so we'll see. We've just got to figure it out, but if you've got two great post-up players, you've got to utilize it."

This was never supposed to be the season of crossed fingers, with Lakers players and coaches alike just hoping that their tremendous mixture of talent would find a way to mesh. But here they are, with late December drawing near and the top spot in the Western Conference that so many thought would be theirs fading away (they're nine games behind Oklahoma City).

D'Antoni now faces a challenge similar to his last stop in New York, as he will face pressure to adjust his system to the Lakers' talent if these next few weeks don't go well. For now, though, he needs more time to iron out these big man wrinkles while holding out hope that Steve Nash can be the cure-all when he returns.

Nash, who has been out since Oct. 31 because of a fracture in his left fibula and also because of nerve pain, will have two key practices on Thursday and Friday after an off-day on Wednesday and may be back as soon as Saturday at the Golden State Warriors. In his latest absence, there was salt poured directly in that particular wound as former Lakers point guard Ramon Sessions had 20 points in 28 minutes in his first game back after leaving as a free agent last summer. Nash replacements Chris Duhon and Darius Morris, meanwhile, mustered a combined nine points and six assists in 52 minutes.

But the question of Gasol and how he fits here didn't change in the two-plus weeks he spent resting those 32-year-old knees, as there is a square-peg-round-hole component that was on display yet again against this Bobcats team that blew a third-quarter, 18-point lead and lost for the 12th consecutive time. It didn't help matters that the signals being sent by those around Gasol hardly cleared things up.

Before the game, D'Antoni reiterated that Howard would be a focal point in the paint but that Gasol would have to adjust.

"It's Pau who has to expand his game, and he'll expand out in the corner threes and he needs to take a couple, and we'll get him in the post when we can," D'Antoni said, emphasizing those last three words as if to pound the point that he's making no promises to Pau. "But if we can't, we'll just get him relaxed and then everything will be good‚?¶Just try to figure out how we're going to win, how we're going to co-exist."

Bryant, who isn't the one being paid to manage the team, was far more willing to demand that Gasol play in the paint.

"I don't think he's going to have a new role (than previous seasons); he's not," said Bryant, who had 30 points, seven assists and six rebounds. "No. We're going to post him. We're going to put him at the elbow. He can obviously make plays on the perimeter, and he will because he's skillful enough to do it, but we're going to play to his strengths ‚?? for sure.

"Like I said, we're going to post him. Mike knows that. We'll move him around a lot, because Pau can do a lot‚?¶We're going to post him because that's what he does best."

The question of how they would play together was hardly answered during the game, as just 16 of Gasol's 29 minutes came with Howard on the floor. That was due in part to the fact that Howard (16 points, 18 rebounds, four blocks) dealt with foul trouble throughout.

Four of the five lineups in which they played together were not effective, according to stats provided by the NBA, with a cumulative plus-minus point differential of negative-29. The one lineup with Gasol and Howard that was productive resulted in a positive-seven plus-minus result in two minutes and also included Morris, Jodie Meeks, and Metta World Peace. The lineup that essentially won the game for the Lakers, with a plus-18 in 12 minutes in all, included Bryant, Gasol, Meeks, Morris and World Peace.

As Gasol knows, the onus of making this work between the big men is partly on them.

"You have to alternate (offensively) ‚?? it's your turn, my turn, it's all good," Gasol explained. "We have that level of confidence in each other and communication, but still we haven't been able to figure it out within the system how to work it out. But hopefully it'll come."

While Gasol and Howard both want to operate in the post as often as possible, there are two realities that make this quite the quandary: 1) as Gasol said on Tuesday and D'Antoni's former boss in Phoenix, TNT analyst Steve Kerr told USA TODAY Sports recently, this system typically only has room for one big man, and 2) Howard is the free-agent-to-be who has been pegged by the Lakers as their next great star, meaning he'll certainly be made more of a priority than Gasol, whose game (and role) has declined in recent years and who is owed approximately $38 million for this season and next.

In D'Antoni's system, as his brother and assistant coach, Dan D'Antoni, said on Nov. 21, Gasol was expected to play a role similar to the one held by versatile small forward Boris Diaw during their storied Phoenix days from 2005 to 2008 ‚?? a middle man of sorts who scores when needed but acts as a secondary facilitator from the perimeter much of the time. Five weeks in, and D'Antoni is still figuring out how to execute that vision.

"I think so," Mike D'Antoni said when asked if he was confident Gasol could succeed in his system. "There's no reason not to (believe that). We do have to find the right balance between him and Dwight in the post and all that stuff that goes with it. But I would be shocked if he can't (succeed) - just because he'd be good in any system."

But if he's not good in this system, will D'Antoni make the necessary changes?

"It's not difficult (to compromise) because the ultimate thing is to win," he said. "I'm not going to compromise and then lose. That's what kind of happened a little bit before (earlier this season), and I'm not going to do that. But every coach is going to try to find what's best for each player individually, and try to incorporate. You still do the same things, and just tweak it. It doesn't have to change the whole thing - I would hope."

Gasol's best stretch came early in the fourth quarter ‚?? a driving layup to the right that came off a Bryant screen up top and cut the Bobcats' lead to five; a textbook give-and-go with World Peace from the left block in which Gasol's perfectly-timed handoff led to the layup that trimmed it to three.

Gasol could be seen skipping off the floor when Charlotte coach Mike Dunlap called a timeout to slow what was an 8-0 run, but the good times wouldn't last long. As had happened numerous times before his recent injury, he was taken out by D'Antoni not long after and would wind up spending most of the most crucial moments on the bench. He sat on the bench for the final 2:36 of play after Howard took his place.

"Uh, well, hopefully that won't happen too often," Gasol told reporters about being taken out late. "Hopefully it won't happen too often, because I think when the game is on the line I need to be on the court. That's what I get paid to do."